Given a backlog that has delayed thousands of unemployment checks for weeks, the state said late Tuesday it will send anyone with a held-up claim for unemployment their money immediately.

Since Sept. 3, the Employment Development Department has been working to implement a new automated system to process claims online. But the system is having glitches in processing claims that have a complexity in them, the department reports.

There are 770,000 Californians on unemployment, and on Wedneday 73,000 claimants still had not received their weekly payments, which range from $40 to $450 per week.

The EDD says it has been working to correct the issues, but that it doesn’t have the manpower to do so more quickly because of federal budget cuts.

At 11:37 p.m. Tuesday, the agency announced that it will just pay everyone starting on Thursday and try to get the money back later if the claim turns out to be erroneous.

The decision came from Marty Morgenstern, secretary of the Labor and Workforce Development Agency. In a memo to EDD Chief Deputy Director Sharon Hilliard, he said the money must get to those who need it. In the memo, he called the backlog unacceptable.

“It is unlikely that the claims backlog will be reduced quickly enough to respond to the very real financial hardship now being experienced by too many of our residents relying on timely payment of their UI benefits,” the memo said. “Consequently, I am directing EDD to immediately begin the process of paying backlogged claims for continued UI benefits prior to a final determination of eligibility. Such work will have to be completed later and at that time EDD will act to recover any resulting overpayments that might occur.”

The payment would be welcome news to Katy Lopez, 47, of Paradise Hills. She was laid off in August from her job as a San Diego Gas & Electric call-in meter reader. She was on unemployment, but her claim became complex because she reported working two hours when the company paid her for her time returning her uniform.

Lopez, who gets $438 per week, said she hasn’t gotten any money in four weeks.

“My utilities are late, I’m grocery shopping on a tight budget, my husband has maxed out his credit cards for gas,” she said, noting her upcoming car payment and the struggle to pay for her 13-year-old daughter’s ballet classes. “It’s just been really stressful on everyone.”

The EDD did not specify how it would get the money back if an error is made.

Kelly Cunningham, economist at the National University System Institute for Policy Research, expressed concern that the state would spend more money and effort trying to get back overpayments than the overpayments were actually worth. He said the move is evident of bureaucratic inefficiencies.

“It will probably take more to make it up later,” he said. “I wonder if they would just throw up their hands and say it’s not worth it.”

Loree Levy, a spokeswoman for the EDD, said the backlog does not affect new claims, which are processed under a different system. That means those who file for the first time will still need to prove eligibility to begin receiving money.

Levy said the EDD has an established system for recouping overpayments, including deducting owed amounts from future unemployment checks.